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“I couldn’t!” He grabs at his hair and yanks. “I couldn’t listen! I didn’t want to! Because as hurt as you were, I hurt worse.”

“Could you be any more callous?” I cry, tears welling and spilling down my cheeks.

“It’s the truth! My truth!” Slapping at his chest, Ryx fights back tears of his own. Jaw locked, he snarls and pushes off the ground. “Imagine knowing deep in your heart that something is wrong, but you can’t remember what? Feeling a soul-crushing hatred but not why? Being told by everyone that the one place that might bring you peace is a lost cause? Fighting tooth and nail to suppress the empty space that used to be full?”

“Yeah? Well, try being locked in a cell by a psychopath who likes little boys!” I stand so we are on equal footing.

“I was beaten to the point that Salem thought I was dead! They couldn’t get me to wake up for weeks.”

The laugh is bitter and full of malice. I shake my head. “How does that validate your pain but invalidate mine? How does that make yours more important? Deserving?”

He’s seething, chest pumping with heavy breaths. “Because none of it would’ve happened if it wasn’t for you,” he growls. “I know that to be true. If I’d never met you, never fallen for your pretty eyes and fake kindness, none of this would have happened. I would have escaped sooner, found my people and—”

“If it weren’t for me, you would be dead,” I counter. “The only reason you can even talk properly is because of me.”

“And if it weren’t for me, you’d still be that stupid little boy living in a fantasy.”

We’re closer than before, chests almost bumping. I want to lash out with my mastery—hurt him like he’s hurt me. By the first seer, I want it so badly. But another kind of yearning pulls at me, too. Something sharper, hotter. Our nearness beckons it to come out of hiding. The lines are blurring too fast. What was meant to be a stake to the heart is now a fiery temptation.

I’d try to kill him as easily as I’d give myself to him.

“Like I’ve ever needed you.” We both know it’s a lie, but lies are meant to hurt.

His stare hardens. That addictive scent floods the air, choking me. My knees threaten to buckle, my chin wants to lift in submission—to bare my throat and beg. I hate that he can pull that reaction from me. Hate that I don’t have a single clue why. As if his scent isn’t bad enough, what he says next completely throws me off-kilter.

“I needed you,” he growls, dark pupils swallowing his irises. He grips the front of my shirt and jerks me flush against him. “I needed you to keep your fucking promise.”

My stomach swoops violently as our fronts seal. “I thought you didn’t remember me?” I make it a point to be as vile as possible with my questioning so he won’t notice how badly I’m trembling. “I thought it was all a lie!”

Dipping his head, eyes sharp as a predator, his right hand leaves my shirt and seals around the base of my skull. “I remember you, Mindeater,” he spits. “You’ve haunted my fucking dreams.”

Ryx crushes his mouth to mine.

Air punches from my lungs. My heart bangs crazed fists against my ribs.

This can’t be happening. It isn’t happening.

Right?

Ryx…is kissing me. He’s kissing me. Those thoughts fly out of my head like wisps of smoke when Ryx’s bare hand cups my cheek. Electricity zaps from my scalp to my toes, the neon void bright in my mind’s eye. But unlike every other time, it doesn’t try to drag me inside. There’s no pain in my stomach, no urgency to flee. There’s only Ryx’s mouth and mine.

Years of unbridled want grab hold of my core functioning, tearing through any conscious decision making. He’s giving me everything I’ve ever asked for without even realizing it.

When he breaks the kiss, I chase his lips. “Do not take this from me,” I demand.

“I won’t hold back,” he warns, breath hot on my cheeks. “We do this, and there’s no erasing it.”

I meet his eyes, dig my fingers into his waist. “I’ve waited my whole life for you to touch me. Show me what I’ve missed.”

“Fuck it,” Ryx growls and lifts me by my hips.

My legs wrap around him as my arms secure behind his neck. One second, we’re standing in the center of the small room. The next, I’m crushed against the wall. Ryx kisses me like he does everything else. With violence. With determination. With purpose. Every nerve bursts to life under my skin as I desperately try to keep up with his vicious assault.

My movements have no finesse. It’s painfully obvious I’ve never done this before, but Ryx doesn’t seem to care. He pushes his tongue between my lips, licking directly into my mouth. When I moan helplessly, he matches the sound with one of his own. With one arm banded around my middle, he reaches down to aggressively palm my ass.

If the wounds on his face bother him, he doesn’t show it.

Something sharp pokes at my lips while Ryx grinds against me. I can feel the hard ridge of his cock. It’s pure instinct now as I match the roll of his hips. An unbearable heat coats me from head to toe, a fire in my core as something wet leaks from my entrance.